21% of Job Seekers Use Mobile Devices to Search Job Boards — Up From 1% a Year Ago

LinkUp, a vertical search engine for jobs, recently released first quarter 2011 data showing mobile visitor activity. LinkUp reported that mobile traffic jumped to 20.8 percent of overall first quarter traffic, up from 1.1 percent the same period a year ago.

Washington, D.C. led all regions with the largest percentage of mobile traffic, recording 56 percent of all job seekers coming from a mobile device. Followed by:

• Illinois (31.7 percent)
• Georgia (31.3 percent)
• Mississippi (30.8 percent)
• Texas (28.4 percent)

The states that showed the lowest percentage of mobile visitors were Nebraska, Arkansas, Iowa and the Dakotas.

Topping the list of cities was Chicago, sending 6.5 percent of overall mobile job seeker traffic, followed by New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta, and Minneapolis. These 5 cities sent nearly 25 percent of all mobile traffic to the search engine.

“Direct mobile traffic was our fastest growing segment throughout the first quarter of 2011,” commented Toby Dayton, LinkUp’s President and CEO. “With devices like the iPad and other tablets increasing in popularity, we anticipate job hunting to continue its fast-paced migration towards mobile.”

According to Dayton, 79.7 percent of LinkUp’s mobile visitors used an Android device to search for jobs, up from 21.2 percent during the same period the year before. The iPhone fell from dominating last year’s first quarter numbers at 62.1 percent, down to 12.3 percent in first quarter 2011. BlackBerry came in just under 0.5 percent for all job seekers.